


Away We Go

by darthrevaan (Burning_Nightingale)



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Complicated Relationships, Gen, Minor Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-14
Updated: 2017-05-14
Packaged: 2018-10-31 09:21:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,911
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10896378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Burning_Nightingale/pseuds/darthrevaan
Summary: After the Mother of Invention's crash, South stays with the project.North goes with Tex.





	Away We Go

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the RvB Rare Pair Week, but it didn't turn out particularly shippy. I'm kinda surprised at this one, since I don't usually write North at all! But hopefully I gave it a good go :)
> 
> I should also say that the setting is heavily inspired by the descriptions in [The Fall by anneapocalypse](http://archiveofourown.org/works/10422309), which you should all check out!

South stays with the project. They make her an offer and she goes for it.

“You picked your side already,” she tells him before she leaves. “But I won’t tell them you’re alive. For old time’s sakes.”

“They’ll find out soon enough,” North says.

South shrugs. Then she leaves.

Tex watches North watch South as she trudges off into the white landscape. When the lone purple figure finally vanishes from sight, she breaks the silence. “So. Where now?”

“Anywhere that’s not here,” North says, his voice dull and tired. Theta flickers concern in the back of his head, but North ignores him.

Tex doesn’t question him. “Gotcha,” she says, and then she starts walking.

North follows.

/

They spend the next few days marching over snow and tundra. North can’t tell if Tex knows where she’s going, but it’s a direction to go, so he follows her. There’s something simple and almost calming in that.

On the fourth day out from the MoI’s crash site they find a simulation base, seemingly abandoned. The inside isn’t much warmer than the  outside, but it offers protection from the windchill and crates of dry rations. North mixes up some of the nutrient shakes on autopilot and brings them down to Tex in the basement.

She’s fiddling with what looks like an old, clapped out generator. “If they haven’t been gone too long this thing might still start up,” she says over her shoulder.

“And if they have?” North asks, setting the two glasses down on the table.

“Then thank god for our temp controlled suits.” She glances over at him. “Thanks, but I don’t need one.”

“It’s been four days,” North says incredulously, “If you don’t eat-”

“No, I mean I really don’t _need_ one,” Tex says, her voice heavy with implication. When he just stares at her, she snaps, “I don’t need to eat, North.”

That throws him. “You don’t need… Then what are… Are you some kind of robot?”

“Yeah,” Tex says flatly, “I’m some kind of robot.”

North drops the subject and sits down to drink the nutrient shake.

/

The generator doesn’t start, so Tex heads south, to where its warmer and more hospitable. North doesn’t protest; he hates the cold.

“Do you know where you’re going?” he asks as they trudge downhill through a snow-filled gully.

“I have an idea,” Tex says with a shrug.

 _I could scan the channels,_ Theta says. It’s the first time he’s spoken in days. _Try to crack a frequency._

North smiles a little despite himself. “That would be good, buddy.”

He feels the faintest warm glow at the back of his mind, and then nothing.

/

The landscape changes quickly as they head south, melting from snow and tundra through harsh steppe into swathes of mountains, green alpine meadows and crystal clear lakes. Tex must have some kind of map, because she leads them unerringly from simulation base to simulation base, convincing or threatening the sim troopers to give them supplies along the way.

It takes about a week for Theta to break Command’s encrypted comm channel. It’s alive with reports, both of rogue agent movements and progress at the MoI crash site. It seems the Project will allow the ship to rest where she fell, and scavenge what they can from the wreckage. A ship like that is an irreplaceable resource, so either she’s too damaged to be salvaged, or it’s a cover-up of some kind. North suspects the latter.

It’s hard, the first time he hears South’s voice on the radio. Knowing her job is now hunting for him. From what he hears, however, that seems to be a secondary priority; right now all her reports are concerning Maine’s whereabouts.

They travel for weeks before he finally asks the question that’s been bothering him.

“You know exactly where we’re going, right?” he asks Tex as they sit around a small, concealed campfire. He’s so sure that it barely comes out sounding like a question. “You have a destination we’re heading to.”

“I’ve got a map,” Tex say slowly. “I… downloaded some things, before the ship crashed.”

“Any of them happen to be files incriminating the Project?” North asks. He’s aiming for casual, but he just sounds tired.

“Yeah,” Tex says quietly. “Stuff that’ll blow the whole Project apart, if I get it to the UNSC.”

“Unless they already know about it,” North says.

There’s silence for a moment. “You think they do?” Tex asks.

“You know what they say about Spartans. If the UNSC’s involved in suspect genetics experiments, can’t see why they’d draw the line at AI.”

“You haven’t seen the files,” Tex says softly.

“I know something fishy was going on,” North says. “Otherwise I would’ve let South blow your head off.”

“But you didn’t. Then you abandoned her to follow me.” Tex doesn’t sound accusing; more like she’s asking a question.

“I stopped South getting into a fight with you because I suspected you were doing the right thing; I didn’t expect the whole fucking spaceship to come down on our heads. I was just trying to get her out of there, trying to get her safe. It was just survival at that point.” He sighs heavily. “It was all survival, Tex. She’ll be safer with the Project, so I let her go.”

“She’s your sister, but you didn’t stay with her?” Tex says. She sounds slightly angry now.

“The job offer was for her. Not for me,” North says tightly. “I’m a fugitive now, like you. I wasn’t going to drag her down with me.” After a moment of tense silence, he adds, “If you have a plan, I want to hear it.”

Tex stares at him for a moment, her helmet unreadable as ever. Then she says, “We need to get off-world. The only place I know might have a ship is Central Command, so we’re going there.”

“Fine.”

They don’t exchange any more words that night.

/

 _There are guards all around the perimeter_ , Theta says. _And I can’t guarantee your suits will prevent you from detection_.

He says it all in North’s head, strangely reluctant to talk aloud. North doesn’t question it; the fact that Theta’s talking at all is a blessing.

Tex is quiet when he relays the information to her. “We can’t just bust our way in there, then,” she says after a moment.

“Knowing you, you probably could.”

She laughs a little. “Yeah, maybe. But better not to risk it.” She considers the base in front of them, down the wide sweep of the hill. They’re concealed in the rough rock formations on the ridge, out of sensor range. Hopefully.

Eventually Tex says, “The airfield’s on the edge of the base. If we can sneak around, we can come at it hard and fast and get a bird before they know we’re there.”

North surveys the half of the airfield they can see from their vantage point, then nods. “It’ll have to be that Prowler,” he says, “Nothing else will have a slipspace drive.”

“Right.” Tex slips back down the ridge. “Come on, lanky.”

North sighs to himself and follows.

/

They circle wide around the base, coming back at it from the south. The airfield simply peters out into the rough scrub; no fence, but at least fifteen guards in sight. There’s no cover between the rocks they’re crouched behind and the ships, and the distance is a good hundred meters.

“Ready to run?” North asks dryly.

“You stay here,” Tex says, “When I hit them, start taking them out.”

“And you’ll get over there how?”

Tex turns her head to him, and then her image ripples. She fades and then vanishes from sight almost completely, only a faint shimmer of her form left, like heat haze over hot ground.

“I’ll admit, that will probably work,” North says. He unslings his rifle from the maglock on his back. “I’ll wait for your signal.”

He hears her laugh, and then her hazy form moves, slinking slowly out of cover. The natural heat haze from the hot scrub is so thick that he loses her almost immediately. He sits and waits, checking his gun, listening.

The _crack_ of armour hitting armour is his cue. There’s a yell and a stutter of gunfire as North swings around the rock and aims down his sights. He’s pulled the trigger before he realizes he didn’t take a moment to assess the battlefield before he had a target in his sights; Theta did it all for him.

That he didn’t even notice is a worrying problem he’ll have to think about later.

Tex rips through the field, still invisible, and North takes out any target left over. Theta seems to know where Tex is, because they don’t come close to hitting her.

When the gunfire has been silent a few seconds Tex says over their channel, “Come on, we’ve got a minute at best.”

North takes the gap between the rocks and the airfield at a dead run, forgoing a defensive zigzag for speed, praying no one has their sights on him. He makes it to the nearest Pelican unscathed, then darts from ship to ship until he reaches the Prowler.

The ramp is already down, and Tex is sitting in the pilot’s seat. “Buckle in,” she says, gesturing to the co-pilot’s chair. “This could get rough.”

“You know how to fly this, right?” North says, strapping in. It seems ludicrous that this question has only just occurred to him; Tex’s aura of invulnerability apparently colours his perception of all her abilities.

“Mostly.” Tex hits some buttons and the engine roars into life.

A light on the console blinks on, and a cool male voice says, “This vehicle is not scheduled for launch. Please cease attempts to-”

“Freelancer code 58612, codename Texas,” Tex snaps. “Authorizing emergency launch.”

There’s a tense, endless moment, and then the ship AI says, “Acknowledged. Beginning takeoff procedure.”

There’s no time now to talk about why that code worked, but North files that thought away for later.

The light above the comm set is flashing now, indicating they’re being hailed, but they both ignore it. Tex jerks the joystick upward, and the ship responds, rising less than smoothly from the tarmac. Tex swings the stick left, and they swivel for a moment before crashing into something with a loud _boom_ and a jolt. “That was definitely the Pelican’s fault for being in the way,” Tex mutters.

North’s answering laugh has a clear edge of nerves.

As Tex lifts the Prowler slowly higher a muffled, repeated _thunk_ noise comes from below their feet. “We are taking fire. The shields are holding,” the unruffled AI informs them.

“Just rifle fire?” Tex snaps.

“Yes,” the AI confirms. “Your trajectory to orbit is locked in. Would you like guidance?”

“Fuck it,” Tex says, and pulls the stick up again.

They blaze upward in a trail of fire, the ship rattling like it’s about to tear apart. “Escape velocity reached,” the AI says, “Leaving Sanguinus orbit.”

“Any orbital defences?” Tex asks. She sounds like she’s gritting her teeth; North wonders vaguely if she has teeth.

“There are none.”

“Good.” Tex eases off on the throttle as the rattling tapers off, indicating that they’ve reached orbit. “Plot in a slipspace course to… the nearest UNSC outpost.” She looks at North, the tilt of her helmet questioning. He nods. “And make sure it’s got military police,” Tex says, “We need to report a crime.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hit me up at darthrevaan.tumblr.com for questions, chats and random RvB stuff!


End file.
